The Poetry Of...
Marie Gail Stratford...................
The Absence
We center ourselves around the empty
place in our puzzle, hover at the
breakfast table like vultures feasting
on her absence, converse with her
silence among ourselves.
Each morning we rise, neglecting
to don the clothes a loss
like this demands, and paint
our faces brittle with cheer so that
the mask once grown to fit pales
in danger of shattering.
Cold as porcelain to ourselves,
we circumvent the void in ever-
widening circles until, rescued
by individual tangents, we separate
on trajectories--
never summoning the courage to look this storm in the eye;
never pausing to reconstruct our mutual fragmentation.
Alternative to Suicide
She wanted to be fabulous--
little black dress accentuating
her curves, matching open-toed
sling backs that revealed
fire-engine toenails whose sirens
echo from the tips
of manicured fingers.
She swept her chestnut locks, kissed
auburn by the summer sun, into the clasp
of a rhinestone butterfly. Curls
dribbled down her back.
With care she painted her face
to match the honeyed look
of last week's cover girl.
Readied at last she left home in style,
drove to the mini mart for a soda, then
returned to watch Deep Space 9
reruns before tucking herself in bed.
Expecting
On the day we found mold
climbing across the basement walls,
you were eight months along; a baby
would join us soon.
I scrubbed the walls with Clorox while
you sorted items from half-packed boxes.
We pooled our efforts in collecting
a passel of copyrighted materials
to exchange at Half-Price Books.
Halfway into a pile of discarded toys
Curious George emerged--tuffed, stuffed
and grinning ear to ear. You set
him next to the collapsed crib, and I
knew without you saying, we'd uncovered
our child's legacy.
